4/29/2023 0 Comments Vertical alignment texmacs![]() tex, xetex, latex, xelatex, biblatex, texi2dvi, latexmk. None of which I understand or want to learn. ![]() It's a mess of multiple command line tools which run each other. So was the Commodore 64, but you wouldn't use it to write your thesis on in 2020, now, would you? The problem is that you pretty much need to know when to use LaTeX to reap the actual benefits.īottom line: it's a leftover from the 1980s. There are cases where it is tremendously useful, it may be easier than the alternatives, and the quality of the product is usually quite good. None of that is meant to discourage you from learning LaTeX. Not only is is non-trivial to do, but it is entangled in markup that is frequently difficult to read and may require a "compilation" to see the outcome. Pretty much anything you may need to do is doable, but it is non-trivial to figure out. Tables and figures may not appear where you wish them to and there are times when you may wish to do something unusual, such as placing a wide table on it's own page and rotating it 90 degrees. Once you have everything you need and know how to use it, there is the problem of creating the actual document. There is no way to get around the latter. Most people avoid the former by installing a rather massive TeX distribution that satisfies most of their needs. You'll need to figure out how to properly install those macros and you will need to figure out how to use them. In many respects, it is like working with a library with programming. If the standard macros don't do what you want of them, you either need to create your own or find some made by someone else. LaTeX is also good for certain types of technical publications, particularly those involving mathematics, since it handles the typesetting.īeyond that, LaTeX is an unwieldy mess. This is useful when preparing an articles or books for publication (when the publisher supports or accepts LaTeX). One is that it encourages the writer to focus upon the logical structure of documents, rather than the formatting. LaTeX is a collection of TeX macros that are used while preparing documents, and probably isn't worth the effort to learn unless you have a specific need for it. TeX is a typesetting system that may be interesting to learn if you're interested in that sort of thing.
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